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Human Rights Campaign Endorses & Invests In 27 Candidates For Virginia General Assembly

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HRC is investing in the 27 candidates, all Democrats, in hopes of passing stronger protections for LGBTQ Virginians in the next General Assembly session.

On Thursday, Human Rights Campaign formally announced their decision to make a “six-figure” investment into the 2019 Virginia General Assembly campaign. Their campaign will take the form of endorsements and donations to 27 different candidates currently running for a seat on Virginia’s General Assembly.

“HRC is proud to endorse these pro-equality champions who will be our partners in achieving long-overdue non-discrimination protections for LGBTQ Virginians,” HRC President Alphonso David said in a statement. “Virginia is at a turning point: voters are fed up with politicians who insist on playing politics with the lives of LGBTQ people. Virginians deserve leaders who will fight for them and bring people together, not pit us against each other.”

All of the candidates receiving endorsements and investments from HRC are Democrats; 18 are women, and 10 are people of color. The endorsements constitute the largest program HRC has ever launched in Virginia. It will focus on “Equality Voters,” a HRC-defined category the group says it used “sophisticated analytics” to identify throughout the country in a 2018 program. The group says that their Virginia program will target 1.2 million of these Equality Voters in 27 districts around Virginia.

“In the coming months, HRC will work tirelessly to turn out the 1.2 million Equality Voters in Virginia and elect new leadership in Richmond that will put the needs of Virginians ahead of the needs of special interests,” David said in a statement.

In the most recent General Assembly session, at the beginning of 2019, a bipartisan majority of delegates supported two LGBTQ-focused anti-discrimination bills that had been proposed in that session. One, HB 2067, merely made the prohibitions against discrimination on basis of sexual orientation and gender identity for state employees, currently enforced by an executive order signed by Governor Northam on his first day in office, a permanent state law. The other, HB 2677, added prohibitions against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity to Virginia’s Fair Housing Law.

Similar bills have passed with bipartisan support several times in the Virginia State Senate. However, despite widespread support for both bills, high-powered Republicans in the House Of Delegates, including Speaker of the House Kirk Cox and Majority Caucus Chairman Tim Hugo, worked to prevent both bills from coming to a vote in committee.

Among the candidates HRC is endorsing in this election cycle are Sheila Bynum-Coleman, who is running against Cox, and Dan Helmer, who is running against Hugo. Bynum-Coleman’s chances are seen as particularly strong in light of the fact that the recent anti-gerrymandering reforms passed in Virginia led District 66, which Cox currently represents, to be redrawn, making it 32 points more Democratic, according to Virginia Public Access Project, than it was previously.

“For the past six years, the Republican-controlled State Senate has passed legislation to protect LGBT people from discrimination,” said Equality Virginia Deputy Director Vee Lamneck in a statement. “But despite strong support from within his own Republican caucus, House Speaker Kirk Cox has repeatedly killed a number of bills that would have ensured LGBT people were treated fairly and equitably under our laws including common-sense, bipartisan bills that would have provided nondiscrimination protections for LGBT Virginians. Virginia can’t afford to allow discrimination to continue in our commonwealth. We need new leadership that will truly represent Virginia’s values.”

The full list of candidates that HRC is endorsing this year can be seen at their website.

Photo via HRC.org

Mike Pence Blasted For Appearing with Anti-LGBTQ Extremists Three Times in Five Days

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The Vice President continues to be blatant in his support for the erosion of LGBTQ rights, and his support of those who work against us.

Vice President Mike Pence has spent three of the past five days appearing at conferences and on stage with anti-LGBTQ extremists, including one who calls gay people “terrorists” and compares them to ISIS, as well as a group that appears on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s list of anti-gay hate groups. Some are starting to notice and call him out for it.

“Less than a week after appearing at an Erick Erickson-sponsored conference, and a day after appearing with anti-LGBTQ extremist Sam Brownback, Mike Pence continues his anti-LGBTQ crusade with an appearance at an event organized by the anti-LGBTQ hate group the Alliance Defending Freedom,” the Human Rights Campaign says in an email. HRC points to the Vice President’s “close ties” to ADF, a group that HRC says “is among the most horrific of any group operating in the United States.”

The Vice President late Tuesday morning addressed the ADF, a group that successfully represented an anti-gay Christian baker at the U.S. Supreme Court and works to deprive LGBTQ people of their civil rights, while offering false narratives. Pence, speaking at the Ritz-Carlton in Arlington, Virginia, bragged that he and the Trump administration have “taken action to protect the conscience rights of doctors and nurses and healthcare providers,” and “gone to court to protect the right to religious expression in the public square,” while praising the ADF for being “there every step of the way.”

The Trump administration claims it is working to decriminalize homosexuality around the world (there do not appear to be any public reports on its progress) and yet the Vice President is bragging about his work with the ADF, a group that, according to HRC, “believes in the re-criminalization of homosexuality in the U.S. and across the globe.”

ADF also “has advocated for the sterilization of trans people,” and its “extremist views have found their way into Trump administration and state legislative actions.”